purple colour.

Moonbow

Moderator Note

re-pete-a said:
The colour purple was said on this forum to have been in existance only around the 1400's...

Please can you link to that thread, it would be useful to put this one into context. I'm not seeing the relationship to the origin or development of Tarot.

Thanks
 

re-pete-a

Colour was a topic used in the crowley,thoth threads about 06.08 This year. The findings in Lucretus's ,The nature of things, was posted here because it's historicaly interesting. Some of the comments (from memory) came from this site. Hence the posting here.
 

kwaw

re-pete-a said:
The findings in Lucretus's ,The nature of things, was posted here because it's historicaly interesting.

And Lucretius was rediscovered in the 15th century and very popular in the 15th and 16th centuries, including within the courtly circles in which triomphi / tarot makes its first known appearance. I think Lucretius has been referenced on the forum before in reference to interpreting tarot imagery too (atomism in relation to bateleur and the empresses 'bag' for example).
 

re-pete-a

Kwaw, thanks for your reply. It seems Moonbow is right , most of what's been posted here would be better served in a philosophy section or spirituality.
 

kwaw

kwaw said:
And Lucretius was rediscovered in the 15th century and very popular in the 15th and 16th centuries, including within the courtly circles in which triomphi / tarot makes its first known appearance.

Such as the Florentine poet and humanist pedgaogue Angelo Poliziano, and the ferrarese poet and translator of latin and greek classics for Ercole d'Est and creator of the first referenced card deck of 22 triumphs Boiardo for example, who translates or otherwise imitates Lucretius in passages of his own works (examples of such influences along with others are noted in Amorum Libri: The Lyric Poems of Matteo Maria Boiardo translated with introduction by Andrea di Tommaso), and Berni who reworked Boiardo into the florentine vernacular.

1.

Launched on a deeper sea, my pinnace, rear
Thy sail, prepared to plough the billows dark ;
And you, ye lucid stars, by whom I steer
My feeble vessel to its destined mark,
Shine forth upon her course benign and clear,
And beam propitious on the daring barque
About to stem an ocean so profound :
While I your praises and your works resound.

2.

O, holy mother of Jeneas ! O,
Daughter of Jove ! thou bliss of gods above
And men beneath ; Venus, who makest grow
Green herb and plant, and fillest all with love ;
Thou creatures that would else be cold and slow,
Dost with thy sovereign instinct warm and move,
Thou dost all jarring things in peace unite
The world's eternal spirit, life and light.

3.

At thine appearance storm and rain have ceased,
And zephyr has unlocked the genial ground ;
Leap the wild herds ; 'tis wanton nature's feast,
And the green woods with singing birds resound ;
While by strange pleasure stung, the savage beast
Lives but for love ; what time their greenwood round
All creatures rove, or couch upon the sward,
Discord and hate forgot, in sweet accord.

4-.

Thee, kind and gentle star ! thy suppliant prays ;
To thee I sue by every bolt which flies
Thro' the fifth planet, melting with thy rays,
When panting on thy lap the godhead lies,
And lock'd within thine arms, with upward gaze,
Feeds on thy visage his desiring eyes :
That thou wilt gain for me his grace, and grown
Propitious, with his grace accord thine own.

(Introduction to second book of Boiardo's Orlando by Berni - based upon the invocation of Venus in Lucretius).